Confocal microscopes are applicable for implementation in a variety of fields. For example, confocal microscopes can be used to obtain images, for guidance and other applications with medical imaging technologies for which imaging systems such as CT, MRI, and PET have been used. However, while confocal microscopes have exquisite resolution, many have large bulk optics and relatively slow scan speeds, which can present challenges to the implementation of confocal microscopes in a variety of applications.
A variety of confocal microscopes and related applications have involved the use of micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) scanners, and other miniaturized components for optical, mechanical and/or electrical aspects of such microscopes. For example, dual-axis confocal (DAC) microscopes provide two separate beams for the illumination and collection of light, which are respectively aligned to overlap each other at a common confocal image-point. These illumination and collection beams are synchronously scanned and de-scanned respectively by a single scanning mirror.
While useful in a variety of applications, these approaches have been difficult to implement under various imaging conditions and to achieve certain results. For example, various optical components such as lenses can be difficult and/or expensive to miniaturize, or suffer from issues such as those relating to beam aberrations. In addition, many such approaches have not been capable of producing a device having a desirable field of view (FOV) and working distance (WD).